Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi on Friday refuted the contention of Vice-Chairman of the National Commission for Scheduled Castes N.M. Kamble that the State government did not consult the Commission before enacting a law, providing three per cent reservation to Arunthathiars within the overall quota of SCs.
In a statement, Mr. Karunanidhi said Chief Secretary wrote to Chairman of the Commission Buta Singh on November 25, 2008 in this regard. The Commission replied to the government on February 19, 2009.
The Chief Minister argued that as per the rule, any such proposal should be brought to the notice of the Commission but getting consent of the panel was not mandatory. As the approval of the Commission had not come, the government went ahead with enacting the law after consulting a one-man panel headed by M.S.Janarthanam, former High Court Judge. This was done “out of concern for Arunthathiars” that there should not be any delay in providing exclusive reservation to the community, he said. He regretted Mr. Kamble’s description of the law as unconstitutional. The government had given information to the panel as per the questionnaire sent by the Commission. As for Mr. Kamble’s criticism regarding the conviction rate of cases filed in the State, Mr. Karunanidhi said it appeared that the criticism was made just to blame government counsels and courts. During the State-level review meeting taken by the Commission, Chief Secretary [K.S. Sripathi], Home Secretary [S. Malathi], Finance Secretary [K.Gnanadesikan] and other officials had given proper explanations. Even then, Mr. Kamble had “unnecessarily found fault” with the government.
Giving an account of various welfare measures undertaken by the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam government since 1969, the Chief Minister said the quantum of reservation for SC/Scheduled Tribes was increased from 16 per cent to 18 per cent in 1971. While taking away one percentage point from the general pool, the DMK government, in 1990, earmarked one per cent to STs and 18 per cent to SCs.
The government had been ensuring flow of funds under the SC Sub Plan greater than 19 per cent [in proportion to the population of SCs]. The divisible expenditure out of State Plan Funds was Rs. 567 crore in 2005-2006. This went up to Rs. 2,615 crore in 2009-2010. Mr. Karunanidhi said it was regrettable that the Vice-Chairman, suppressing all these facts, described the State government as one that did not care for the welfare of SCs. The Chief Minister said he would bring the factual position to the notice of the Union government, particularly Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
In another statement, Mr Karunanidhi said the Vice-Chairman perhaps went by the version of those who were voicing views against the development of backward classes, most backward classes and SCs.
